Frequently Asked Questions

Do you need more information?

Technical Support Services

"Essential IT Services, Inc is always there for us when we need them. Many of our issues are fixed quickly by remote access, getting us back to work much faster. We recently upgraded all of our computers and the new ones work much faster and are much more reliable."

General FAQ

Essential IT Services is the Service Mark of Essential IT Services, Inc, a Kansas Corporation.

Essential means "of the utmost importance." Essential IT Services is a collection of Information Technology Services that are critical to a smooth, efficient, and productive IT Department. Essential IT Services are critical to helping an organization reach maximum efficiency, productivity, and profitability.

A. An SMB is a Small or Medium sized Business. This is primarily a marketing term used to refer to businesses that are generally larger than a Small Office/Home Office (SOHO) and smaller than a large company with thousands of employees. Defining which business is "small" and which business is "medium" depends upon what country you live in, your particular industry, your total annual revenue, and other factors. For our purposes, we are not concerned with differentiating between small and medium. The SMB acronym definitely describes the clients we serve. Therefore, we choose to utilize our own definition of SMB, which for us is any business entity that has between 5 and 250 personal computers/laptops in its organization.

Q. Why is proactive (preventative) maintenance important to my PCs, servers, and network?

A. Preventative maintenance on your PCs, servers, and network is a lot like preventative maintenance on your car. In your car, if you change the oil, replace the brake pads, and perform other similar maintenance, your car will last for years and hundreds of thousands of miles. However, if you fail to perform this maintenance on a routine basis, when something does break, it is going to cost significantly more to repair or replace the car than if you had simply done the maintenance when it was required. This exact same concept applies to your PCs, servers, and network. However, because your PCs, servers, and network are critical to your ability to operate your business, the consequence of failing to maintain them has the potential to be much more devastating to your business.

Q. What are the benefits of a properly configured and maintained network?

A. A properly configured and maintained network is essential to every SMB that relies upon technology to manage and operate. Two of the biggest benefits are as follows:

Your network will run much more reliably and with a significantly higher uptime, resulting in much higher efficiency and productivity.

Proper configuration and maintenance is the foundation for ensuring that your company actually receives a return on investment in your network. (To maximize your ROI, you must first achieve proper configuration and maintenance and supplement that with Virtual CIO/CTO Services.)

Data Protection Services FAQ

Q. What type of Data Backup Plans do you recommend?

A. Data Backup Plans are a very critical feature and must be evaluated for each client’s unique business environment. Generally speaking, we have standard backup plans that we recommend for most clients, and we customize the plan as necessary to meet the needs of individual clients. Our standard plans include routine full backups with incremental backups between full backups.

A. We always recommend some form of off-site data storage. However, we have learned over the years that relying on people to change tapes, remove those tapes to a secure off-site location and then return them in time to perform the next full backup never really works! It is simple human nature that we forget, we get busy, we get sick, etc., and sooner or later, off-site storage fails. Automatic data replication to an off-site location is the perfect solution to this problem. Therefore, we recommend that all of your critical backup data be replicated off in "real-time" as it is created.

A. From a service aspect, we allow unlimited data replication. However, there are certain factors that will limit the amount of data that you can replicate. Here are some of those factors:

The size of your Internet connection in your office has a maximum upload speed. This is a physical limitation. To understand this limitation, think about a garden hose: If you have a 1/2 inch hose, you can only get so much water through that hose. To increase the amount of water, you must buy a bigger hose. The same is true for the size of your Internet "pipe".

The number of hours in your particular replication window. Again, combined with the size of your Internet "pipe" you can only upload a finite amount of data in a finite amount of time.

Cost. Although our pricing for data replication is very aggressive and competitive, the costs of a larger Internet "pipe" and the cost of the remote storage facility will have finite limits for every client.

Q. Where does my replicated data go? I have sensitive information, and I want to ensure that I have control of it.

A. Your data can be replicated to one of the following locations:

You may choose to replicate to an off-site facility that is controlled by Essential IT Services, Inc.

You may choose to replicate to any off-site facility under your control where you have a PC or Server that is managed by Essential IT Services, Inc, has sufficient data storage capability, and has sufficient Internet access.

Virtual CIO/CTO FAQ

Q. What is a CIO and what job functions does he/she perform?

A. CIO is an acronym for Chief Information Officer. In a large business with thousands of employees, the CIO is an executive role that usually reports directly to the Chief Executive Officer (CEO). The CIO is responsible for overseeing all uses of IT in the organization and ensures that the IT strategy of the organization is in alignment with the overall business strategy of the organization.

A. CTO is an acronym for Chief Technology Officer. In a large business with thousands of employees, the CTO is a similar role to the CIO, except that the CTO is not usually responsible for IT strategy. The CTO usually reports to the CIO. The CTO is a more technical role and is responsible for the keeping the IT systems up and running at maximum efficiency.

Q. Do I really need Virtual CIO/CTO Services? We are a small company and have very limited IT needs.

A. It is our basic belief that all SMBs need access to Virtual CIO/CTO services. The only difference between an SMB and a large enterprise is the scale of services required. Large enterprises can justify a full time CIO and/or CTO. SMBs generally need Virtual CIO/CTO Services on a more limited basis. However, the fact remains that if you want to maximize your return on investment in your IT infrastructure, you need these services. While your company may survive without maximizing its ROI in IT infrastructure, we do not believe that you could ever reach your maximum fiscal potential. We are so certain that this is true that we include five hours of Virtual CIO/CTO services in our Managed Essentials package.

A. Managed Services can help you make your business more profitable by providing these important benefits:

Managed Services allow you to outsource your IT management to a trusted and reliable business partner, freeing up your time to concentrate on the profit-making activities of your business, resulting in greater efficiencies in both areas.

Managed Services gives you access to needed Reactive Maintenance to get your employees back to work with minimal downtime.

More importantly, Managed Services gives you access to Proactive (preventative) Maintenance that will keep your employees working longer with fewer unplanned downtimes.

Managed Services will give you the piece of mind knowing that your valuable company data is protected by a professional Data Protection Services Company.

Managed Services will give you access to a Trusted Advisor who is an advocate for your business and will help you make better IT decisions resulting in higher efficiency and productivity which results in higher profitability.